As part of student exchange (a school program, not our own initiative), Child One is spending ten days in Germany, based in the western city of Rheine, near the Dutch border north of Muenster and Frankfurt.

Here’s her first e-mail home, typed on a German keyboard.

Gah, this is so annoying, the #y# and #z# keys are in the wrong places. (Ignore anz tzpos concerning those two letters.) We were delazed not once, not twice, but three times! We missed our connecting flight because the plane arrived late (i can#t remember whz anzmore…) then we missed the second one because the lines to get into the rest of the terminal (or whatever, i dunno) were too long and the plane left while we were sitting there. So, after the 9:20 left, we had to wait for the next flight, WHICH WAS AT ONE IN THE AFTERNOON. Bleh. But it was alright because i had books to read and there was free hot chocolate, of which i had like four or five cups.

We sat in the plane for an hour, and the plane was REALLZ REALLZ QUITE EXTRAORDINARILZ SHAKZ when we were lifting off. (i must admit i clung to V for a bit. Mz three least favourite deaths are falling, drowning, and suffocating.) It evened out and before it did i had alreadz let go off poor V.

We finallz got to our poor host families at three-ish, and i was promptlz scooped awaz bz A and her mother. We hung out at A#s house for a bit, then went to dinner with some of A#s (and her familz#s) friends. We just got back before i started this e-mail) and it is currentlz 7:22 local time (as all the times in this note have been). I haven#t slept zet, as i was waiting for nightfall, but am now off to crash.

Toodles.

(Btw i am not editing this e-mail. i am TIRED. Do it ZOURSELVES.)

I made some minor edits, but I left her use of the lower case “i” in reference to herself. And the z/y. And the “/’/# typos.